BENGALURU: Five constituencies in Karnataka -- ShimogaNSE 0.00 %, Bellary and Mandya for the Lok Sabha, and Ramanagara and Jamakhandi for the Legislative Assembly, will face bypolls on Saturday. The election authorities will count votes on Tuesday -- the day celebrated as Narakachaturdashi in South India.

The bypolls for the Lok Sabha constituencies were caused by the resignation of incumbents -- B.S.Yeddyurappa, B.Sriramulu and C.S.Puttaraju -- on their election as MLAs in the May 12 polls. Puttaraju not just won as JD(S) MLA, but has also become Minor Irrigation Minister. The other two represent BJP and sit in the Opposition. The Jamakhandi seat is going to polls as its MLA Siddu Nyamagouda died, and in Ramanagara, its MLA, chief minister H.D.Kumaraswamy resigned the seat. He had won from both Ramanagara and Channapattana, and preferred to retain the latter.

In Ramanagara, CM’s wife Anitha Kumaraswamy is contesting as JD(S) candidate, and is backed by the coalition partner Congress. It is expected that she will win with a stupendous margin as her main opponent L.Chandrashekar of the BJP quit the contest on Thursday, and announced his support to the JD(S). In the process, he also joined the Congress, the party he originally belonged to.

In Jamakhandi, the late MLA’s son Anand Nyamagouda is contesting on Congress ticket, but faces serious contest from BJP’s Shrikant Kulkarni. The Congress leaders, led by former CM Siddaramaiah have campaigned well for Nyamagouda, and the contest here is keenly watched as Kulkarni is a BJP veteran in local politics.

Karnataka Deputy CM and Home Minister G Parameshwara held a meeting with top cops and government officials regarding the preparations for Tipu Jayanthi celebrations in the state. Issues regarding security and permission for event were discussed in the meeting.

Following was the outcome of the meeting:

1) No procession for or against Tipu Jayanthi will be allowed on Nov 10th
2) The permission to celebrate Tipu Jayanthi is allowed only indoors
3) Banners regarding Tipu Jayanthi is not allowed to be posted randomly. Banners can be put up only in and around the venue only
4) Provocative messages on social media will be monitored
5) Govt has given instructions to district administrations across the state to celebrate Tipu Jayanthi
6) Funds have been released from the Dept of Kannada and Culture to organise events
7) Additional 10 RAF companies have been requested and they will be deployed across the state
8) Whomsoever tries to disrupt communal harmony will be dealt seriously

As India’s general elections loom, individual states are emerging as crucial electoral battlefields. Today’s by-election in the the southern state of Karnataka, is as crucial as they get, as it provides a political weather vane ahead of the 2019 general election.

While no date has yet been set for the national election, it must take place before the current parliamentary term expires on May 19 next year.

Just months ago, in May this year, the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party, or BJP, emerged as the single-largest party in the state in the state elections. But the ruling Congress Party, which did not have the numbers, displayed great alacrity in setting up an alliance with the regional party, the Janta Dal-Secular, or JD-S.

That edged the BJP out of power in Karnataka and returned the Congress – albeit, in an alliance with the JD-S. Naturally, the Congress agreed to play second fiddle to JD-S to keep the BJP dis-empowered.

A political weather vane ahead of 2019

However, Karnataka today holds by-elections for seats that were vacated. Three seats for the federal Parliament and two for the state assembly are up for grabs. The by-elections for the parliamentary seats have been necessitated by the death of one sitting member, and by several seats being vacated by the incumbent law makers.

The five candidates fielded by the three principal parties are all next of kin of political heavyweights in Karnataka. As such, they provide textbook cases in nepotism.

Current chief minister HD Kumaraswamy’s wife Anitha contests from Ramanagara, on a JD-S ticket. The state assembly’s designated opposition leader from the BJP, BS Yeddyurappa’s son BY Raghavendra, is the candidate from Shivamogga. Senior BJP leader B Sriramulu’s sister J Shanta has been fielded in Ballari. After Jamkhandi MLA Siddu Nyamagouda of the Congress died in a car accident, the ticket was passed on to his son Anand Nyamagouda while former Karnataka chief minister S Bangarappa’s son Madhu Bangarappa is the JD-S candidate against Yeddyurappa’s son.

All this means Saturday’s contest provide a political weather vane ahead of the crucial 2019 general election.

In a setback to BJP just before the upcoming elections in five states, the Congress-JD(S) coalition in Karnataka scored an emphatic victory in three Lok Sabha seats and two assembly constituencies that went to the bypolls last weekend. The bypolls result came as a major setback for the BJP as it lost the Ballari Lok Sabha seat, considered a stronghold of the mining barons -- the Reddy brothers.

The bypolls were seen as a prestigious popularity test for the ruling Congress-JDS coalition ..

Bengaluru: Every time chief minister H D Kumaraswamy speaks about his health at a public rally, he tends to let his emotions run away with him. It inevitably draws flak from the opposition. On Friday, Kumaraswamy made an emotional speech at a rally in Malavalli in Mandya district and instantly drew criticism from BJP state president and former chief minister B S Yeddyurappa, who was also criss-crossing the district.

The two traded barbs as they campaigned all day in Mandya and Ramanagar .

Responding to this, Yeddyurappa, at a rally in Maddur said, Kumaraswamy should stop making emotional speeches about his health and should instead focus on developmental work and providing good governance.

“There is anarchy in the state as people are suffering. Developmental work has come to a standstill,” Yeddyurappa said. “Your emotional speeches won’t affect the people as they are already in distress.”

Bengaluru: Former Prime Minister and Janata Dal (Secular) or JD(S) supremo, H.D.Deve Gowda, on Saturday asserted his resolve to work together with the Congress for the upcoming November 3 by-polls, to help set a strong foundation for coalition partners in the run-up to next year’s Lok Sabha elections.

His sharing of the dias with his former friend-turned-political rival Siddaramaiah after a gap of nearly 12 years, highlights the importance of the upcoming by-polls, which the coalition believes will set the trend for next year, where the two parties have joined hands to take on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

“We have not come together for personal gain but for the larger interest of the country,” Gowda said, addressing one of the first top-level joint press conferences of the JD(S)-Congress coalition.

The heated exchanges and trading of charges between the two parties before the May elections was ‘irrelevant’ now, senior Congress leader Siddaramaiah said.

Gowda and Siddaramaiah were joined by Karnataka chief minister H.D.Kumaraswamy of the JD(S), Congress state president Dinesh Gundu Rao, deputy CM, G. Parameshwara and Cabinet minister D.K.Shivakumar, putting up a spectacle of solidarity and appealing to its grass root level workers to overcome differences and combine forces to defeat the BJP.

Three parliamentary constituencies — Shivamogga, Ballari and Mandya — and two Assembly seats — Ramanagaram and Jamkhandi — will head to polls on November 3. According to the agreement, JD(S) will field candidates in Shivamogga, Mandya and Ramanagaram, while the Congress will contest the other two seats.

Gowda and Siddaramaiah shared a tempestuous past, which had become one of the biggest stumbling blocks for the coalition government, with the latter being viewed as the man leading all Congress dissidents and trying to destabilise the government, four months since it came into being. Kumaraswamy said though there had been differences between the two leaders, they were like two bodies and one soul.

Several top leaders from regional outfits in other states had descended on the swearing in ceremony of Kumaraswamy in May, that had set the foundation for a consolidated Opposition.

However, the Congress party faced a jolt when Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) chief Mayawati pulled out of the evolving Mahagathbandhan, ahead of the elections in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. BSP, which had an alliance with the JD(S) in Karnataka, continued to remain in government even though its lone representative legislator, N.Mahesh, resigned from the Kumaraswamy-led Cabinet last week.

“Fact of the matter is these two family-run political parties have come together to save the existence of one family here in Karnataka and another family back in Delhi. A desperate attempt to save their existence will be wiped out by voters of Karnataka,” the state BJP said on Twitter, in reaction to the joint press conference.

BENGALURU: AICC president Rahul Gandhi plans to address HAL employees at Minsk Square in Cubbon Park, near the HAL corporate office in Bengaluru on Saturday on Rafale in an attempt to step up pressure on the NDA government on the controversial fighter aircraft deal.

The interaction has been scheduled at 3.30 pm. Gandhi will speak about how the Centre “favoured Reliance” over HAL in the deal, according to a tweet by the Karnataka Congress. The million dollar question, however, is how man ..